The present invention relates to the field of coil winding and, more particularly, to a coil winding form or holder on which wire coils may be wound in different lengths.
Various winding apparatus are known which are employed for winding sets of coils having different lengths and different pitches. A winding apparatus for winding these coils generally includes a rotatable coil winding flyer for winding coils of wire from a spool around a stepped coil holder or coil form. The coil holder is used to form coils of different lengths by winding on the different steps on the holder. As the wire coils are formed on the coil holder, the different length coils are moved from the coil holder onto a fork. The fork having coils of stator wire held between its teeth is inserted into an electric motor to introduce the stator wire to the motor.
In the winding of concentric stator wire coils it is necessary to wind the desired number of turns on each of the coil form steps and to move the flyer with respect to the coil form to space the coils or to move from one step to the next. A control means generally controls the winding of the coils determining the number and pitch of the coils to be wound on each of the levels of the coil form. An example of a coil winding apparatus and associated control means is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,046,175.
The differing number and size of the coils required for different stators, dictate the use of more than one coil form to achieve all the necessary sizes. However, switching between different coil forms is time consuming, delaying work, and reducing cell throughput. In order to reduce switching time, a plurality of coil forms can be mounted on a turret which is then rotated for winding on the different forms as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,851,682. However, a simpler and more compact solution to the need for multiple coil forms would be desirable.
As the coils are being wound on the coil form by rotation of the coil winding flyer around the coil form, they are dropped onto a hollow cylindrical fork with longitudinal slots. The fork is positioned to receive each of the coils in a particular set of slots. However, as the coils slide off the coil form onto the fork slack may occur in some of the coils which allows the coils to drop into an improper slot, or skip a tooth in the fork. The coils which have been collected on the fork are forced into the stator slots of a motor by the fork whose teeth fit into the stator slots in the motor. The presence of coils which have dropped into an improper slot in the fork and thus, end up in a wrong slot in the stator decreases the overall efficiency of the motor.